


love, more slow

by farnear



Category: SKAM (TV)
Genre: F/F, Gen, a verbal equivalent of a glass of prosecco, sweet small & indulgent
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-02
Updated: 2017-04-02
Packaged: 2018-10-14 00:37:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 948
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10525239
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/farnear/pseuds/farnear
Summary: Photography, baroque – Eva doesn’t really care. She is happy to see this: Vilde, relaxed.





	

**Author's Note:**

> it's spring and i wanted to make a friend smile. the title & the quote from 'to his coy mistress', the last line ripped from 'richard ii'. my agenda: appropriate early modern literature & make it gay.

_Let us roll all our strength and all_

_Our sweetness up into one ball_

‘To His Coy Mistress’ A. Marvell

 

* * *

 

 

It’s the last bright hour of a lazy summer day. Prosecco shines in Eva’s glass, full of light. Her sunbed is right on the edge of the cool, her garden heaves with hot greenness, and her best friends are all here. They had wine and the ice cream they made this morning – they added goat cheese Noora insisted on, and topped it with krokan Chris had from home. They all had seconds, Vilde and Noora too, and Vilde licked her bowl empty.

There’s a smudge of the ice cream left on her nose.

‘Vilde,’ Noora calls and, when Vilde turns, snaps a photo of her.

Vilde shrieks.

‘Noora!’ Then she blinks, as if surprised by the volume of her own voice, and carries on, with an attempt to sound casual. She isn’t mad – not with the wine-blush – but unsure. ‘Noora, you know you mustn’t post any photos of me before I review them’.

‘I’d never,’ Noora says, and shows Vilde the phone. ‘It’s beautiful, though. Like art, with the half-turn, here, and the light on your hair. Full on baroque chic, I promise’. Vilde is considering it. ‘And ice cream is a great look on you’.

‘What? Do I –‘ Vilde raises her hand to her face and touches her mouth, her chin, helpless. ‘Gosh, I need a tissue – Chris, a tissue?’

Chris shrugs.

‘Here,’ Sana takes a pack out of her handbag, and throws it at Vilde, who struggles to catch it, but eventually succeeds.

Eva watches her wipe the smudge off.

After this, there is a quiet. Sana and Chris are stretched on the sunbeds next to Eva. Noora follows a ladybug with her phone. Vilde sits cross-legged on the ground and sips on her wine. Her flower crown is awry and her white lace dress has green grass stains on it, but if Vilde notices, she isn’t bothered.

Photography, baroque – Eva doesn’t really care. She is happy to see this: Vilde, relaxed.

Vilde hums, and closes her eyes when the prosecco touches her tongue.

‘What do you call it,’ Chris slurs. ‘When it isn’t, uh – not an opt – optical? Yeah, not an optical illusion, but like, with touch?’

Sana just raises her eyebrows. Noora says, ‘This is the stupidest –‘ but she’s interrupted.

‘An illusion with touch?’ It’s Vilde who asks the question, brows furrowed. ‘I’ve never heard –‘

‘But it’s a thing! Sana, give me your hands.’ Sana sighs and sits up. Eva sees just a glimpse from behind Sana’s back. Chris lies her hands on Sana’s, ‘Press against mine,’ she says and then she lets go, and Sana moves. ‘Now – are you feeling it?’

‘It is –’ Sana breaks off. ‘No. I don’t feel anything.’

‘Come on!’ Chris moans, ‘come on, it works!’ She scratches her chin. ‘Maybe you have to be drunk.’

‘Well.’ Sana lies back on her sunbed. ‘Can’t help you there’.

‘I want to try,’ Vilde says, eyes wide. She tries to stand up and wobbles, so she sits back again. ‘Chris, I want to try,’ she repeats. ‘Sit here with me’.

‘But there’re really bad bugs down there.’

‘I’ll do it,’ Eva says and goes to Vilde, slow. She laughs. She’s drunk, and she had so much ice cream, and everyone she loves is in her garden. It’s easy to laugh.

Vilde doesn’t. She is focused, her hands tense.

‘Okay,’ Chris calls, too loud. ‘Okay – so you just, like – one of you has the hands on, uh, the outside, and you, like, push against? And then let go. Yeah, that’s – that’s it’.

‘And what’s supposed to happen?’ Noora asks, sceptic.

‘An illusion.’

‘Do illusions happen?’

‘I – I don’t know – Sana, do they?’

‘This is a very profound question.’

‘Fuck.’

Eva, deep in the grass, doesn’t know if it’s profound, or just Sana’s special brand of bullshit. She doesn’t look to see Sana’s face.

‘So not an illusion,’ Chris tries again. ‘A trick. Anyway. If you have your hands in – in, like, not out – then you feel, like, a ball of air.’

The others laugh and argue. Eva and Vilde are face to face, knee to knee, their fingers curved, as if they had to cup an egg. A small egg they had to never let go of, never fall, never break. Vilde has short fingers and tiny fingernails. She always wears nail polish, even if it’s just colourless pearl-shine. Today she shared her rosy hand lotion with Eva. It was quick and efficient, not one touch too much. Last week they watched _Crimson Peak_ together, and Eva held Vilde’s hands for an hour or more. They were clammy with sweat and chocolate cake. She was scared, but now she doesn’t remember why.

‘Wow,’ Vilde huffs. She pushes her hands against Eva’s. ‘You’re strong’.

Eva laughs and lets go.

‘Oh!’ Vilde slowly moves her hands, and the small egg widens to a small ball, and the ball widens still. The non-existent shape grows in Vilde’s amazed eyes. An illusion, a trick – a gift. Eva gave it to her, small and invisible. Vilde laughs at it, the wonder of the thing between them. It unspools in Eva, slow like honey. Its liquid warmth fills her to the fingertips.

‘It goes on, and on,’ says Vilde.

Then Chris hollers, ‘That’s what she said!, and Noora says, ‘Oh my god’, and Vilde snorts, and right after she claps her hands. She folds them in her lap and looks back at Eva. There’s still some ice cream left in the corner of her mouth.

‘Do you want to?’

And Eva does, and Eva gives: her hands, and all.


End file.
